


Crime Scene Procedure for Asphyxiation by Living Burial

by paxlux



Series: proper procedure [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-18
Updated: 2011-09-18
Packaged: 2017-10-23 20:19:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/254537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paxlux/pseuds/paxlux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He feels like there's a stone in his chest, maybe an albatross around his neck.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crime Scene Procedure for Asphyxiation by Living Burial

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel to [Crime Scene Procedure for Death by Drowning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/242085). This hasn’t been de-Americanized past anything I do on the fly, so apologies for the possible mess.

It's been a week, eight days to be precise.

It's been a week and they're standing in front of an open grave with fog crawling along the ground as if this is a Victorian gothic.

John should be in a nightie.

Sherlock's peering down at the dirt, looking like the serious Byronic hero with his dark hair, pale skin and long coat, and it's been a week since he kissed John, a week since John almost drowned.

He feels like there's a stone in his chest, maybe an albatross around his neck because they haven't discussed it or done it again.

John isn't drowning, but he can't breathe.

He watches as Sherlock kneels next to the grave and a police torch finally illuminates the black rectangular hole.

A coffin on top of a coffin.

A crude wooden box nailed shut with a black cross spray-painted onto it. Dirt is stuck in the paint; it was wet when the coffin was buried; he doesn’t need Sherlock’s brain to tell him that.

"Not Dolores Framingham," John says and Sherlock hmms in reply.

“A coffin on top of a casket,” he says and Lestrade says, “How avant-garde,” the torch jiggling a little as the DI shifts his weight.

John clears his throat. “There’s a difference?”

“A casket is what’s used in modern burial, John,” Sherlock says, standing, and he makes a framing gesture with his palms, “the usual box. A coffin is old-fashioned and six-sided, the dimensions wide at the shoulder area and tapering down to the feet.” He waves the trivia off like smoke with an annoyed expression on his face. “The type people associate with vampires and people rising from the grave.”

“Of course,” Lestrade says and John echoes him, “Of course,” and Sherlock glances at them, nettled.

“Go look it up,” he says a little viciously, “and while you’re doing that, let me meet this person who isn’t Dolores Framingham.”

“False advertising,” Lestrade says with a little laugh, out of place in this black moist graveyard, but this isn’t anything new, this is John’s life and now he knows the difference between a coffin and a casket and which one he’d rather be buried in once Sherlock sends him to a speedy demise.

It’s bound to happen, and soon, because Sherlock is rabbiting away, all dark fluid lines and John wants to taste them, but something went awry, the wires got crossed somewhere and it hasn’t happened again for a week.

“John. John!”

Sherlock calling for him and his voice is like Pavlov’s bell, John _has_ to reply and follow and respond, and he curses under his breath because this is irritating as fuck-all.

He doesn’t seem to have control around Sherlock.

“John!”

He sighs and trails after the stirring wake of Sherlock and his coat.

The coroner waits with a crowbar and Lestrade nods to him. “Ready when you are.”

The nails squeak something awful, as if the coffin doesn’t want to give up its secrets, and John thinks, No one wants to give up their secrets. Maybe it’s best to keep them buried. Deep. In the dark.

The lid pries off with a final screech and a bird screeches in kind out in the trees; it’s all very atmospheric and John sneezes.

A young girl, blonde hair, clothes of a teenager, rainbow-striped socks, jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, and a streak of old blood across her forehead. She’s bled into her hair, striping a whole section red, as if she’s dyed it.

She looks asleep and John thinks, Vampires, and the torch illuminates her face, so pale.

She’s just a child, thirteen or fourteen, and Lestrade mutters, “Bloody fucking hell,” and John is on his knees next to the coffin, snapping on gloves because she looks so asleep, quietly alive, caught in a single moment in this coffin.

Dead, she’s dead, he checks her throat (bruised) and the wound on her head (recent) and her eyes (blue) and he almost chokes when he realises.

“She suffocated. In this coffin. Underground,” he says and Sherlock says, low, voice vibrating into John, “I know.”

“She was alive when she was buried. _Alive_.”

John can’t believe it, he can’t, he can’t imagine going into the ground, alive and breathing, and being stuck in the absolute black until your air runs out, he can’t imagine it, even when he was shot and bleeding into the dirt, he was afraid he’d die and never see the sky again, but this is, this is wholly fucking different.

“She was alive, Sherlock, she—“

Sherlock’s hand is cold, curling around John’s neck, thumb tucked under his jaw. “I know, John.”

John isn’t drowning, but he can’t breathe.

This is what it must’ve felt like to die in a wooden box underground, and he’s only staring into Sherlock’s light eyes, not being put under several feet of earth.

It’s been a week.

“John,” Sherlock says again, a slight lilt in his voice and John shakes his head, but can’t say anything.

Lestrade is balancing on his toes on the other side, across from them. “So she was put in the coffin, buried, and left to die?”

A sweep of fingers through John’s hair at the nape of his neck, and then Sherlock’s gone, talking, striking like lightning through the gloom.

“Yes, yes, unless there’s some other scenario we’re missing. This is a coffin, not a casket—“

“So you told us,” Lestrade interrupts and Sherlock glares at him.

“And I’m _so glad_ you listened, Lestrade, cheers, you actually learned something _new_ , but of course, you didn’t put your education to good use, otherwise, why should I—“

“ _Sherlock_ ,” John warns, mustering enough oxygen to keep checking the body and Sherlock has the temerity to look offended, so John sends him a stern glance, licking his lips out of habit.

And Sherlock is briefly thrown, his eyes going wide, and Lestrade says, “And? _And?_ ”, then Sherlock gives a small shake.

“Lestrade, where would you get a coffin when, nowadays, proper burial calls for a casket? _Coffins aren’t in use anymore_ , only by special request for those who prefer other…accommodations.”

“I suppose you want me to answer that question.”

“ _You_ are the DI, Inspector. It would be your _job_ , I suppose.” He flicks his fingers and John sighs, he’d rather be back in bed, he was having a dream, though now he can’t remember what it was.

“Always in awe of my authority, aren’t you, Sherlock,” Lestrade says and Sherlock retorts, “Always, because it’s a puzzle to me how you came to hold any such authority.”

“ _Sherlock_ ,” John says, yet again, and he doesn’t know how many times he’s had Sherlock’s name in his mouth with that particular flavor. “What else.”

He’s briefly considering a fight, John can see it, but Sherlock gives up after a moment, as if it isn’t worth the brainpower. “Fine. She was alive, she’s scratched at the lid of the coffin; her nail polish is scraped almost off and she has bruises on her fists—“ he mimes pounding on something, _let me out let me out_ , and John shudders—“but the bruises on her neck and the wound on her head were concurrent to each other, one probably led to the other, but neither were fatal, correct, Dr. Watson?”

Sherlock’s only calling him that to get back at him for something, needle him into a reaction and John thinks, It’s been a bloody week, you tosser, and he says, “Correct, Mr. Holmes, so why don’t you just hurry up and solve this so we can all go home. Make sure you do it in bloody dramatic fashion. It has to be _really_ extra special, a really spectacular performance though or we won’t believe you.”

When he looks up, Sherlock’s face is frozen in dark surprise, as if he caught John about to push him into the nearby open grave and even Lestrade appears a little jostled out of his usual police stance as John strips off his gloves and stalks away.

Lestrade’s voice carries after him, but John can’t hear what he said, he can’t breathe, and he feels as if he’s got earth in his ears, his nose, his mouth.

He doesn’t know what to do, he doesn’t know how to save himself, because it’s possible he’s in deeper than he meant and Sherlock is so calm on the surface, as if there’s nothing troubling him, nothing whatsoever. John doesn’t know how to reach in and drag up the anchor so Sherlock can be undone, so he can be like he was eight days ago, swaying to music, drowning them in saltwater notes and greyscale and it’s possible John died that night, so he isn’t allowed anything else.

He closes his eyes and loses his hearing and he might as well be dead and gone, place flowers at his grave, maybe here in this Victorian gothic nightmare with fog crawling over the ground, then there’s a hand on his shoulder.

“John.”

“What, Sherlock. What.”

“I’ve disappointed you. Again.” That rich tone, pouring through the air, thick black warmth, slowing the blood in John’s veins like sap and he shrugs at Sherlock’s hand.

“Yes, it’s possible,” he says because Sherlock’s the genius, the world’s only consulting detective, he solves cases as his work, to stave off boredom, he should be fucking able to figure out this and present John with a solution.

He can solve a murder, he can solve John’s breathing problem.

“The cross was an attempt at absolution, for the departed soul and for the killer,” Sherlock says as John opens his eyes, coming into his view like an angel statue prepared for a gravestone, a palm up in request and petition. “It was rushed, the killer spraying it on in an act of desperation for faith.”

“And how could you possibly know that,” John says, he isn’t going to let Sherlock’s magic gloss over this and Sherlock watches him.

“His hand shook.”

He pushes his open palm towards John and John honestly doesn’t know what he’s asking, if he’s asking anything at all because this is _Sherlock_ , who thinks layers are necessary to life, to keep it from becoming too mundane.

Sherlock steps back, straightening his shoulders in his coat, and all John can see now is half his face, one bright eye like a button.

“Lestrade, we need to track Dolores Framingham’s descendants.”

“Why.” Lestrade’s striding through fog and John scowls, this is all very stagy, very haunted storybook cover type stuff, but he’s the one who can’t breathe, so he scowls harder.

“I don’t think her grave was chosen at random. It’s far from the gate, but not near the middle, nor near the church, and it’s not close to the back. It’s not hidden behind shrubbery or trees, or even those gaudy weeping angels. No, the killer knew how to find this grave and came to it out of habit. Sheer familiarity.”

“Alright, sounds good, but then again, if you say it just right, everything you say sounds good,” Lestrade says, grinning crookedly at John and John nods, _you’ve got something there._

“Oh shut up. Don’t act jealous,” Sherlock replies, already headed for the ostentatious wrought-iron gate. “It’s cold out here and I could do with some tea. Dolores Framingham, Lestrade. She’s related to our buried girl. And not because they share a cemetery plot.”

“ _I_ could do with some tea,” the DI grumbles and John’s planted his feet, not following Sherlock, because he can’t allow Sherlock to win too many battles, it’s just not healthy for someone with an ego like his and it probably gives him the wrong idea.

Or several wrong ideas.

“And the coffin, Lestrade, _the coffin_. Maybe a specialty store, but plain quality and simplicity suggest a prop,” the imperious voice cuts through the air.

“Is there anything else we can do,” John says to Lestrade, ignoring how Sherlock’s standing by a particularly tall plinth, eyeing it and John distastefully in equal measure.

Lestrade shakes his head, gaze rolling to the sky. “No, just wish me happy hunting. It’d be nice to get ahead of Egotistical over there.”

John laughs, scaring something nocturnal off in the trees and he wants to sleep suddenly. “Happy hunting.”

Then he finally heads over to Sherlock and he can’t breathe every step of the way.

There’s a taxi waiting and Sherlock holds the door for John, letting him crawl in first, which throws him a bit and it’s an evil genius of a plan because when Sherlock says, “You’ve got questions,” John can only stare at him for a minute.

“Yes, I’ve got questions. I’ve always got questions. The big all-important question though is if you’ll provide any answers that’ll do me any bloody good.”

Sherlock watches him, scarf tugged high up under his chin, the collar of his coat framing him like ravens on his shoulders.

“Is this because of what happened eight days ago,” he says.

And John thinks he might completely explode, his heart ticking like a time bomb and when it goes off, he can’t be held accountable for what happens.

“Are you serious.”

“Most of the time,” Sherlock says, a smile curling one corner of his mouth. “Did you know you lick your lips a lot. Nervous habit?”

“Something like that,” John says because he won’t be sidetracked. “Yes, eight days ago. You kissed me.”

“You kissed _me_.”

He feels his face go flat. Sherlock sounds like he’s six and in the school yard again.

“And?”

“And. You’re an ongoing case. I don’t—“ A bundle of energy usually, Sherlock’s body goes still, only his fingers moving where he’s tracing the edge of his coat pocket.

John takes a leap, which isn’t the first, ever since he got in a taxi and told the driver to take him to Baker Street, 221b. “You don’t know all my variables.”

Swift annoyance shadows over Sherlock’s expression, his mouth pressed tight. “No." Then he sighs, as if he’s angry and confessed something. “No, that’s why they’re variables.”

“But you know all my constants.”

They’re back in the realm of city lights and yellows-and-whites drift over Sherlock like a scanner and John thinks, I want to x-ray you, just to see you down to your bones, see which ones you’ve broken and which ones you haven’t; he’d be able to read Sherlock as well as Sherlock reads him and Sherlock says, “Yes.”

“Then what’s the problem.” John takes to fidgeting too, it’s passed to him, earthquake-like, his fingers turning over pound coins in his pockets.

“You can’t possibly have decided to—“

John can’t breathe and Sherlock looks like he’s suffering from oxygen deprivation and they both smell of damp, dark earth.

“What.”

Then Sherlock shrugs in such an uncharacteristic manner, John _laughs_ , he can’t help it, the high and mighty consulting detective fucking _shrugged_ in the back of a taxi talking about relationship issues as they drive away from a foggy cemetery.

“Tell me something, Sherlock, you don’t always know the answer right away, do you. You _guess._ ”

In the sweep of a streetlight, Sherlock frowns, that one that means he’s offended, gone huffish, and this _is_ a Victorian gothic, Sherlock should be wearing a monocle and gloves and a crazy stiff suit, so he can splutter how insulted he is by the insinuation.

And John should be in a nightie.

He doesn’t wait because waiting is partially what saves him and half what almost kills him and there’s steady, then there’s flat-out adrenaline, and he doesn’t have to choose between the two.

He’s been waiting a week, but now he won’t anymore.

He kisses Sherlock, hand fisted in his coat lapel, to trap him there and when Sherlock kisses back, John can breathe. He can see, he can hear, he can breathe and Sherlock’s throat is warm where John’s fingers have slipped and Sherlock tastes like cold air and chocolate biscuits.

He loses track of time, hours maybe, days—

Then Sherlock’s pulling away, scrabbling at his pocket. “John, _John_ , I know.”

“Know what?”

But John isn’t quick enough, Sherlock has his phone, dialing. “Lestrade, it’s a relative, either her father or mother. It was a fight, most likely an accident, _until it wasn’t_. Whoever killed her thought she was dead _when they buried her_ ; the girl was, for all intents and purposes, killed twice.”

John knows the feeling, the drop of his stomach and the close of his eyes.

“No, what, no, _no_ , it’s the socks, Lestrade, the socks. She’s in her socks, not trainers, so she must’ve been indoors, somewhere she was at often, somewhere comfortable, where she would regularly take off her shoes. _Home._ ”

His eyes are lit fuses and John hears the ticking time bomb in his chest and it’s possible Sherlock might be the death of him, so he should be buried, like a claymore mine, maybe he’ll be harmless that way once he does ignite.

Sighing, he tries to sit back, but Sherlock’s got him tight, hand around John’s wrist where he was holding Sherlock’s lapel and instead, Sherlock gives him a look, _what do you think you’re doing_ , so John surrenders, listening to Lestrade tinny on the other end of the phone.

“No, no, I won’t meet you in your office, just call after you talk to her parents,” Sherlock says quickly, then he hangs up and his fingers tighten on John, and his eyes narrow, speculative, as if he could see enough of John to deduce him in the dark.

His voice is hoarsely deep. “I hadn’t slept for days. I didn’t think you—“

“Sherlock, you _don’t_ think. All the time. You’re never thinking.” And John sees it now, the little boy in Sherlock who knows everything will go away eventually and no one else is like him, no one else can handle him or talk to him, and Sherlock never quite grew up.

“Why would I do that,” Sherlock says.

“’Cause you’re an idiot,” John says.

A grin, brighter than a smirk and John grins back and Sherlock lets go.

Baker Street, 221b.

John gets the door open, Sherlock right behind him and nothing happens on the stairs, nothing happens after the door closes, it’s fine, it’s all fine, then John crowds him against the kitchen table and kisses him as a reminder.

Sherlock says, “We might have to wait awhile, John,” his face showing that his brain’s distracted, and John misunderstands, thinking, Eight days, then he realises: the case, Lestrade, the grave in the middle of the night. He settles on the sofa with the telly on and Sherlock puts his feet in John’s lap, staring off into space, texting on his phone, only to make random comments about the flickering shows until at some point, the room slowly swims dark and John feels a hand on his face, then he’s asleep.

Five hours later, past dawn and on into morning proper, the father is arrested. He fought with her over curfew and an ASBO; he lost his temper, grabbed her by the throat, she kicked him and fell when he let go, hit her head and that was tragically that. A propmaster for the theaters in the West End, a coffin right at hand, ready for an actor to step out of it on cue.

“He should be commended on his excellent coffin-making abilities,” Sherlock says in Lestrade’s office and John kicks his ankle.

“Not good, Sherlock,” he murmurs, hiding a smile and Lestrade sighs loudly, says, “Yeah, well, I suppose it’s a handy skill in some circles,” a tilt to his head because he told John once he does expect Sherlock to snap some day and though it goes against every fibre of his Scotland Yard badge-and-uniform, Lestrade might help with the body. Maybe.

“There are better ways to dispose of a body, Lestrade. You of all people should know that, after years of quasi-successful police work.” In a single swift movement, Sherlock stands, buttoning his coat. “I’m sure you picked up some tips.”

“ _Quasi_ -successful? Oi!”

But they’re already walking out and John says, “Admit it, a coffin on top of a casket is new.”

“Brand-new,” Sherlock says, “but it’s our fun and not his.”

“Of course, why should we share the fun.”

It’s all very normal, everyday and quiet, and there isn’t a case on hand at the moment, so they head back to Baker Street.

Tea, and John’s pouring the water when Sherlock appears behind him.

“John.”

He turns because he’s learned he really should at least look when Sherlock says his name, there was the unfortunate incident the other day with a burning—

Sherlock kisses him.

The time bomb in John’s chest ratchets up, ticking loud in his ears and he kisses back and Sherlock says something before John can’t breathe.

He stops to drag in air and Sherlock’s eyes are lit fuses.


End file.
